Polarization ray tracing and polarization aberration compensation in reflective astronomical telescopes

Derek Sabatke; J. Scott Knight; Matthew R. Bolcar

doi:10.1117/12.2320759

17 September 2018 Polarization ray tracing and polarization aberration compensation in reflective astronomical telescopes

Derek Sabatke, J. Scott Knight, Matthew R. Bolcar

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 10743, Optical Modeling and Performance Predictions X; 1074307 (2018) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2320759
Event: SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications, 2018, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

Assessing and optimizing polarization performance in the context of ray-based optical design can be challenging. We describe an approach to this problem that decouples polarization effects from optical system geometry for reflective systems. Each surface's polarization properties are parameterized in terms of their impact on retardance and diattenuation in the small angle-of-incidence limit, separating polarization assessment from the task of coating design. A low-resolution ray trace of the system is adequate to determine ray geometry at each interface, which can then be interpolated to rapidly evaluate net Jones Matrix pupil functions. Coating behavior can be easily varied using the ellipsometric parameters to investigate impacts and compensation. Desired values of these parameters can then be specified as constraints in coating design. Investigation with candidate telescope optical designs for LUVOIR show baseline root-mean-square wavefront errors in the nm range for the on-diagonal Jones matrix component, and throughputs of tens of parts per million. Promising possibilities for compensation using a purpose-designed coating on the secondary mirror are discussed, which reduce the on-diagonal wavefront error by a factor ~ 20, with accompanying but more modest reductions in coupling into off-diagonal terms.

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Derek Sabatke, J. Scott Knight, and Matthew R. Bolcar "Polarization ray tracing and polarization aberration compensation in reflective astronomical telescopes", Proc. SPIE 10743, Optical Modeling and Performance Predictions X, 1074307 (17 September 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2320759

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